


The Replica Key

by cruisedirector



Category: DC Cinematic Universe, Man of Steel (2013), Superman - All Media Types, The Wolverine (2013), X-Men (Movies), X-Men (Movieverse), X-Men - All Media Types, X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fusion, Angst, Attraction, Awkward Sexual Situations, Background Jor-El/Lara Lor-Van, Crack Treated Seriously, Crossover, Crossover Pairings, Curiosity, Desire, Feelings, Frustration, Holography, Immortality, Les Misérables References, Loneliness, M/M, Masturbation, Not Canon Compliant, Sharing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-20
Updated: 2013-11-20
Packaged: 2018-01-02 04:39:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,983
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1052627
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cruisedirector/pseuds/cruisedirector
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Logan doesn't remember where he got the charm, so he has no idea it'll summon an alien hologram.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Replica Key

**Author's Note:**

> I have never read a _Superman_ or _X-Men_ comic and I have only superficial fannish knowledge of the movies, so please expect liberties to be taken with canon. I should probably have labeled this story "Les Miserables 2012 Crossover AU" because it will be immediately obvious that it's about Hugh Jackman's Wolverine and Russell Crowe's Jor-El, not any other versions of the characters. Huge thanks to brodinsons for advice and cheerleading.

Logan doesn't remember where he got the charm. He guesses he must've won it from someone who didn't have the cash to pay off a bet, though it's not like him to have accepted something he couldn't use. But he's liked it from the first time he spotted it in the pile of foreign coins and watches he hasn't gotten around to selling or trading -- the strange volcanic shapes, the asymmetrical symbol beneath -- and, since his discovery that it's made from metal too hard for his adamantium claws to slice, he's kept it as a sort of good luck talisman.

Not that Logan believes in good luck. At least he knows better than to hope that the impossibly hard metal might be some kind of clue. Once, he might have been tempted to try to figure out where the thing came from, but now he's content to let it serve as a reminder that the answers to some questions aren't worth the goddamn trouble.

There are plenty of places he could hide where it's warm, plenty of jobs he could find way the hell down south, but there are also plenty of people there, people he might hurt. It's easier to stay up in the ice, dealing with others only when he absolutely has to. There's lots of woods and mountains to explore, and it's not as complicated with wild animals. No point in getting attached to something that might try to tear a man's throat out when it's hungry enough.

He can't really say why he's wandered so far into the frozen Arctic this time, but it's been obvious to him from the very beginning that whatever those government assholes have found under the ice isn't what they're claiming. That's no Soviet submarine, and it sure as hell isn't a piece of Skylab. Though he should know better, Logan lets his curiosity get the better of him. It's so damn cold out that the guards have to be changed frequently, so it isn't difficult to use his adamantium claws to shatter the ice and sneak aboard whatever it is. And it doesn't take higher education to figure out that no matter what technology might have been developed in an underground lab by someone fucking around with mutant powers, this ship wasn't built by any government agency. From the looks of things, it isn't from this world.

It also doesn't take a university degree to figure out that Logan's lucky charm will fit right into what appears to be the command console.

Logan knows it's possible that the entire probe or whatever the hell it is may explode if he messes with it, but he also considers that even if it does, whatever metal the ship is made of might finally be able to blow him to Kingdom Come. That thought alone is a good enough reason for pushing the charm -- no, key, it has to be some kind of key -- into the slot that's been sitting there waiting for it apparently for much longer than Logan has been alive.

He's braced for weapons fire, sirens, a blast powerful enough to knock him across the room. He isn't expecting a computerized report announcing that all systems are operational, then a quiet voice behind him saying, "Welcome. Who are you?"

Whirling around, Logan finds himself facing a man with clear, earnest eyes, a high, aristocratic forehead, and a chin that once must have looked like it was carved from granite. But this man isn't young any longer, and despite his impressive bearing, he isn't particularly tall, nor does he look particularly capable of throwing Logan through one of the metallic bulkheads, though it's hard to tell under the strange robe. "Did I wake you?" Logan asks sharply in return and is startled by how bright the eyes become when the man smiles.

"In a manner of speaking. My consciousness is uploading into this ship's control center. I'm curious how you were able to unlock the system."

Logan steps to the side as he jerks his head toward the charm in the keyhole, though he has the distinct sense that the man who must be a hologram already knows it's there. This guy can probably look right through Logan using the surveillance equipment built into the ship. "Won it in a cage fight. Don't remember from who. Didn't know it had a goddamn computer program in it." He glances around at the elegantly curved metal walls. "I'm guessing you're not from around these parts."

"No, I'm not." Though no longer smiling, the man still gives off the impression of goodwill. He's clearly not afraid of Logan, even if the computer or whatever the fuck is scanning the room can tell what Logan's insides are made of. "What about you?"

"I think you already know the answer to that." It's less a challenge than a declaration that Logan has no patience for bullshit. "They call me the Wolverine. You?"

Once again, he seems to have amused the man, or at least the computer controlling the man. Or maybe Logan has that backwards. "My name is Jor-El," the calm voice says with the authority of someone who's not used to being questioned, and it's impossible not to think of this sonofabitch as a real person, even though Logan knows better. "I come from a planet called Krypton. I had believed that my people might seem like gods to the people of Earth, but I can see that my information is incomplete, Wolverine."

Hearing the handle spoken like that -- _What kind of name is Wolverine?_ \-- makes Logan wince. He shakes his head a bit, then sticks out his hand before realizing that this holographic impression probably can't touch him, which gives him another idea. The claws erupt through the skin as Jor-El stares, not with shock or terror but with a scientific curiosity that's not much more pleasant. "You weren't expecting this?" he asks. Then, since he can already read the answer in Jor-El's level gaze, he adds, "You can call me Logan."

"There are no Kryptonian records of any of our descendants able to do that," says Jor-El softly. Then he asks the one question that Logan isn't expecting from him of all people: "Is it painful?"

"Every single time." The man may look like Victor but he talks like Marie. The skin between Logan's fingers doesn't ache as much as his throat does at the sympathy in the projection's eyes. "What do you care? Let me guess: your people who might seem like gods are looking for a planet to colonize. Here's some advice. Go back and tell them this one's already fucking taken."

"There can be no going back." Suddenly Jor-El's eyes look as wounded as Logan's skin around the slowly retracting claws. "Krypton is no more. Our days of colonizing are over."

Just as Logan's starting to relax -- those government idiots outside think this ship is ancient, it's too late for any more Kryptonians to show up and mess things up -- an even worse thought occurs to him. "That's why you're here," he guesses, his extremities colder now than they felt out on the ice. "Because your people have been here before. And you didn't keep to yourselves, did you?"

His fury appears to interest Jor-El just as much as his claws did, studied with the placid scientific distance that makes Logan want to rip the computer-generated face off right off the Kryptonian, yet there's something mournful in the expression too, as if tranquility might not be Jor-El's emotion of choice but he doesn't have the range to express any other. "You know that we've been here before. This ship is proof enough of that." Before Logan can come up with a retort, Jor-El steps closer, into what would be Logan's personal space if Jor-El were a person instead of a projection. "I believe that you may be proof of it, too, Logan."

"I'm not an alien, I'm a mutant," Logan spits. "There are lots of us. Some hiding in plain sight, some too different to get away with that. Did you have people on Krypton who could control the weather or start fires with their minds?"

Jor-El focuses his gaze on a spot over Logan's head and suddenly there's heat like fucking lasers coming out of his eyes. Logan manages not to shout his surprise, but he can't help coughing at the smell of singed metal, though when he whirls to look, the bulkhead barely seems scorched. "A simulation, of course, since I am a projection and not a live Kryptonian," Jor-El points out. "Controlling the weather might be more complicated. But in this gravity, with a yellow sun, a Kryptonian could fly into the atmosphere and spin quickly enough to create a tornado."

This is insane. Mutants evolved from ordinary humans, everything Logan has ever learned from any scientist has told him that -- some idiots have insisted it was triggered by nuclear radiation from atomic bombs, which is clearly not true in his own case, but even if it were, it wouldn't have involved any fucking aliens. "What are you saying?" he scoffs.

With a sweep of his arm, Jor-El indicates the ship around him. "How old do you believe this vessel is?" Logan tries to remember what they were saying at the base -- hundreds, maybe thousands of years, he can't remember. "My scans indicate that you have lived for more than a century, though I can't be precise because your original bones have been replaced by metal that does not come from this world. This ship is millennia older than that. It's one of our scout ships. My people came here before to investigate your planet because we have common ancestry. We may even be compatible for reproduction."

"Bullshit. Humans evolved from apes. There were no ancient aliens involved." Jor-El's smile is infuriating. "Besides, if we have Kryptonian genes, how come there are more mutants now instead of less? The DNA should be getting weaker, not stronger."

"On my world, we had become experts in genetic engineering. We eradicated disease and created individuals ideally tailored for the roles they would fill, but there were those who believed it had made us weak. My adversary General Zod thought we had corrupted the bloodlines of the finest Houses, and I believed that in removing chance and choice, we had destroyed any opportunity for growth. Perhaps you and others like you are proof that I was right -- perhaps dormant genes and random mutations have allowed those you call mutants to develop free of the limitations of Kryptonians."

For a moment Jor-El looks disgustingly like a proud father. "I wouldn't call us free," growls Logan. "We're hunted. Persecuted. If those people out there found me here, they'd shoot me on sight."

"Yet you were able to come aboard this ship without setting off their alarms." Logan decides that he's more comfortable when Jor-El shares that naughty grin with him instead of gazing at him like a son or a scientific marvel. "You seem to have developed the ability to hide yourself." 

"What about you? Is this the way you looked on Krypton, running around in your bathrobe?" Though Logan intends at least a bit of scorn, he makes Jor-El laugh. Again the thought crosses his mind that Jor-El must really have been something when he was younger. "You're artificially generated, right? So you don't have to be dressed like that. Can you show yourself to me any way you want?" 

There's a sort of shimmer. Logan expects to see Jor-El dressed in a military uniform or a spacesuit, maybe even in a copy of Logan's own clothes. What he doesn't expect is to see Jor-El stark fucking naked. It's obvious at once that Logan has underestimated Jor-El's muscles. Those arms are pretty amazing, and that chest, and holy hell, he's got a big...

"Is that better?" Logan's eyes jerk themselves up to meet Jor-El's, and from the smugness of Jor-El's grin, Logan knows that the ship's computer has been scanning him the entire fucking time. Obviously Jor-El knows that Logan's pulse has jumped, and he's started sweating, and there's too little blood in his brain and too much elsewhere. "I'm not much different from you, in some ways," Jor-El drawls, at least it sounds that way to Logan, and even if it's meant to be a scientific observation, there's no mistaking the way Jor-El's eyes travel up and down Logan's body, assessing him.

"It's been a long time since --" Logan starts to sputter, his face turning red before he decides he doesn't owe any explanation to this damn computer that's obviously screwing with him. Asshole. "Did the real you walk around like that on Krypton? Did the real you even look like that, or is this some perfected avatar version of you?"

"Perfected?" echoes Jor-El. Whether or not he's a computer, he definitely sounds like he's flirting. "When Krypton was destroyed, by my estimation, the 'real me' would have looked a bit older and somewhat worse for wear. But this ship's cortex wouldn't bother to remove my wrinkles and pimples and sag." Jor-El gives his own belly a pinch, low, awfully close to the groin. To Logan's mortification, he can feel his cock twitch in response, which does not escape Jor-El's enhanced vision. "Whereas you seem to be very nearly a _perfect_ physical specimen."

Logan has heard that before, nearly always with a demand or an expectation attached. "I didn't think holograms or whatever you are paid attention to things like that."

The bright eyes crinkle with amusement. "I may possess only a shadow of the original Jor-El's consciousness, but his strongest characteristics determined which of his traits would be retained. Anything that he would have considered interesting, I consider interesting. My people strove for physical and intellectual ideals, but our mates and families were chosen for us by mechanical programs -- I was something of a throwback in that regard. I believed that we should be free to choose our work and our partners."

"Your families were chosen for you?" repeats Logan, confused.

"Our children were created in Genesis Chambers. Until my son, there were no natural conceptions on Krypton for untold cycles." Logan files away that bit of information, that Jor-El has a child, and moreover that Jor-El apparently made that child the old-fashioned way, presumably with a woman. "Our marriages were arranged based on compatibility and sometimes politics. We still had a powerful Council. I was born into the House of El, but the bloodline is a formality. Like everyone I knew, I was a product of the Genesis Chamber, engineered to become a leading scientist."

That explains why Jor-El can't help looking at Logan as if he's a specimen, even if Jor-El also looks like he might wish he could make Logan's clothes disappear as easily as his own. "At least you know what they wanted from you. I don't know who did this to me," he says, holding up his hands with his fingers spread to indicate the now-hidden claws. "But I guess I was born with the ability to heal. And I don't really age."

"A Kryptonian living on your world would seem much the same." Logan can see that Jor-El is itching to examine him, but that's not what makes Logan pull off the heavy coat, then the thick wool beneath. It's not because he's too warm, either, though this part of the ship is shielded from the cold outside, and he's been aware that he's sweating since Jor-El's clothes disappeared. He likes the way Jor-El's eyes follow his every movement, their appreciation obvious even if Jor-El is only a shadow of a man who died a long time ago. With every layer Logan drops, Jor-El looks more pleased. "There are no scars on your skin."

"It takes a lot to scar me." Logan's undershirt hits the floor with the rest, and -- what the hell, this guy isn't even real -- his hands go to his waist, first the lined outer shell, then the thermals, with a pause to take off his boots. Jor-El is watching avidly. "See? Only adamantium bullets can leave a mark on me, plus maybe whatever this ship is made from. I couldn't nick your key."

"My key was meant to travel with my son, but the data cuts off abruptly. Perhaps this key was never finished, or perhaps Lara made another as a failsafe."

Lara, assumes Logan, must be the boy's mother. Jor-El's mate. He could ask whether she was also the love of Jor-El's life, but from the way Jor-El is looking at him, he has a feeling that Jor-El's throwback attractions don't limit themselves to one person. Nor to one gender. "Are you sorry it wound up with me?" he asks, no longer bothering to be embarrassed at the way his cock is showing off its erect length.

"I'm only sorry that I no longer have a physical body." Looking at the hunger in those eyes, Logan is sorry about that, too. It's obvious that Jor-El has quite a lot of control over his program as well as over the systems and atmosphere of the ship -- the naked Kryptonian is showing signs of arousal that mirror those in humans, his chest is flushed and his cock is stiffening, but Logan guesses that if he reached out to take that hard shaft into his hand, his fingers would close around air. "I must content myself merely with observing."

There's a noise behind Logan, but before he can turn, he's practically knocked off his feet by pressure against the backs of his legs. From out of seemingly nowhere, a platform has popped into existence. Jor-El must have summoned it to rise from the floor, a slab covered in the same sort of fabric as the suit that Jor-El had worn. 

A bed. Logan cocks an eyebrow at Jor-El. Maybe he's underestimated this crazy frustrated alien consciousness that hasn't gotten laid for who knows how long and might be planning to fuck Logan some other way. "Are you planning to perform experiments on me? I should warn you, those don't usually end well for whatever sorts of probes you're planning to use."

"I would not conduct any experiment that you did not permit. I didn't ask you to remove your clothes." That's fair enough, and Logan grins. "I had hoped that you would continue to let me observe you."

"Like to watch, do you?" And maybe Logan is as crazy as the frustrated alien consciousness, because there's no denying that his cock likes that idea. He runs one finger up the side and grins more when he hears Jor-El suck in what sounds like a very human breath. "Doesn't seem very fair if it's only one way, though. Does your programming let you do this?" Sitting down on the platform, which is softer than it looks, he spreads his knees and gives his cock a stroke.

"Generally speaking, Kryptonians have had the urge bred out of them." But Jor-El moves his hand to the big swollen Kryptonian cock that would have been a monumental shame to squander. 

"You said you were a throwback." Logan's voice sounds breathy in his own ears. "Did you ever do this on Krypton? Even if you weren't supposed to?"

"I did." There's a sexy catch in Jor-El's throat as he swallows. Logan can't help wondering how so much got recorded for the simulation, even if Jor-El himself created it. He wonders whether this programmable Jor-El can do tricks -- make it bigger, make it thicker, make it come ten times in an hour -- but that's the sort of experiment a sadistic bastard would perform on mutants, so he doesn't ask.

Imagination is free, though, and Logan imagines Jor-El using his robe to hide an erection, rubbing himself through the material of his suit beneath, biting his lip the way he's doing now to muffle the noises he's making. "Did you let yourself finish? You know -- did you ejaculate?"

"Yes." Logan is touching himself shamelessly now, spitting into his palm, sliding his other hand over his balls, and Jor-El is watching with an intensity Logan can't remember from any of his lovers, echoing the movements as if they're different from what Jor-El might have done on Krypton. "Not like that. Just -- quickly, to be certain that the equipment was in working order."

That makes Logan smile again, spreading his legs more widely and leaning back on the platform so that Jor-El can see when he rubs a finger over his own asshole. "So you could make a baby?" he asks, and Jor-El nods. "You never had sex with anyone on Krypton just for fun?"

"It wasn't done." Jor-El's shudder sounds entirely real. Maybe his program is adaptable. Logan presses the fingertip inside himself and is rewarded with a ragged groan from the man watching him. "What you're doing -- I've never --"

"You should find a way to put that consciousness of yours into a real body." Lazily, Logan grins at him, twisting his hand on his own cock. "Preferably one that looks like your real one. What a fucking waste. I could have spent hours riding that cock of yours, watching your mouth around mine..."

Damn it, Jor-El looks like he wants nothing more than to drive his cock into Logan's ass, and Logan would like nothing better than to let him. Here's someone who's entirely untainted by humans and mutants and what they've done to each other, who's almost untouched, who stares at Logan as if he's been waiting not for the son who's disappeared like so much incomplete data, just like so much of Logan's past, but for Logan himself. No shame, no weirdness about having a body different from other people's. Even if Jor-El's nearly a virgin, it would be amazing.

Logan watches Jor-El watch him, groaning with him, imitating him when he rubs a thumb over the head of his cock to taste it and when he twists his fingers on the base. All too soon, Logan's too close, he knows it's about to be over, he doesn't know how Jor-El --

"Gonna come," he pants, seeing Jor-El's eyes widen with recognition, and that's enough to make Logan howl and erupt over his hand, spattering his belly. He hears a soft cry but he can't see to look at Jor-El, not until the spurts stop and he can breathe again.

Jor-El is fully dressed once more, immaculate, impeccable, not a hair out of place, but that's not what Logan notices first, because Jor-El looks wrecked. His expression is devastated and envious and full of gratitude for all that. "I have no memory of my son's face as I sent him to safety," he murmurs. "But even if I did, I think that you would be the most beautiful thing that I have ever seen."

"You're crazy. I'll have to upload you some good porn," Logan tells him, though his smile is half-hearted, despite the pleasure still pumping through him. "But hey, it was really good for me, too." And it was: in spite of everything, in spite of Jor-El not even being physically present for fuck's sake, the connection between them is real, and now Logan is going to carry it with him where he should have memories of his own history -- the face of an alien stranger and his tale that doesn't have an ending.

Yet Jor-El returns the smile, so Logan tries to look happy about the compliment. He can see questions crowding Jor-El's face and braces himself for anything from some expression of disgust about how he plays with himself to some suggestion that now they have to perform a bonding ritual. What he gets is, "On your world, do males often share sexual experiences with other males?"

The words sound so innocent that they almost make Logan laugh, and the answer is so complicated, he doesn't know where to start. Gathering his clothes piece by piece, he settles for, "Yeah. A lot more often than some people would have you believe, though you need to be careful who you ask. But I don't want you to think that I mostly do it with other males, because I like doing it with women, too. Listen, for a long time I took it where I could, and had my heart broken a couple of times, and then I only did it by myself. Not with anyone watching. It got too dangerous."

This, at least, is a concept that Jor-El understands, and he nods. "When you leave here, you must not leave my consciousness active. It's too dangerous." He doesn't mean from the idiots outside, Logan understands. This is a program that feels joy and loneliness and loss, that was created for a purpose it may never be able to fulfill. But Logan isn't ready to think about that yet, though Jor-El isn't finished. "You have already given me more than I had the right to ask, but I would ask a favor."

Sitting up, Logan shrugs a bit. It's more embarrassing to wipe himself off with the back of a sleeve than it was to jack off in front of this phantom, but he tries to make himself presentable, tugging the thermals up. "Sure, if I can."

Jor-El gestures to the console. "I have no idea why this key -- or myself, in this form -- might have come into existence. But there must be a reason. I don't know what has befallen my son and the hope that travels with him. You will live for a very long time. I want you to keep the key with you, and if you have reason to believe that you have discovered the whereabouts of Kal-El, in case something has happened to the key that was meant to travel with him, I ask you to loan him yours."

"Loan?" repeats Logan, not meeting Jor-El's eyes. Of course he has every intention of keeping the key with him, though he understands that right now, he is being dismissed. Possibly for his own safety from the men outside. More likely because Jor-El knows that Logan would just as soon stay. The hell with Jor-El's son and whatever's going on out there in the world. Here's someone Logan can't hurt, can't kill, can't freak out by being a freak. Here's someone who understands what it is to face millennia of being alone.

"Wolverine." The voice pulls Logan back to the present. "There are things that I must tell my son. His fate, and all that is left of my world, may depend on it. But I hope that he will have found another family -- a human family. He will not have need of me for long."

"You might be surprised," says Logan, thinking of the dark place in his thoughts, one of many, where he wishes he had memories of a father, even one far less caring than Jor-El. "I'll do what I can, but I have to tell you, I don't hang out with people much."

"What you can do is all that I would ask." The nod conveys so much warmth that Logan lets himself return it. "This will not be the only ship from Krypton on your planet. The ark that carried my child here is another. There may be more. Your key will activate my program in any of them."

"I promise I'll keep it safe," Logan tells him. He hopes whatever scanning equipment in the ship that's been taking readouts on him all along is proving to Jor-El that he's telling the truth. Of course Logan will keep it safe. It's the only way he'll ever see Jor-El again.

If only it were possible to kiss him.

Since it's not, Logan talks instead. He tells Jor-El about his fractured memory, the shattered lives of mutants, the way the woods smells on a spring morning. Sitting beside him on the bed, Jor-El tells him about flying on war kites, swimming through the Genesis Chamber, forging a lifelong friendship with a man named Zod whom Jor-El will never see again. Logan keeps forgetting that this isn't actually Jor-El but only a projection of him, until, with a sad smile, Jor-El warns him that it's nearly morning and suggests that it's time to power down the command console.

No point in prolonging the inevitable, as much as Logan wishes he could. "I'll keep an eye out for your son," he says gruffly. "And I'll find a way to see you again."

"Soon, I hope." The word undoubtedly means something different to a mechanical consciousness that doesn't feel the passage of time than it does to Logan, but what the hell: it's not like Logan isn't going to be on this planet a good long time. On the scale of centuries, they might as well call it soon. His eyes are watering, but he doesn't bother to hide them from Jor-El as he follows his instructions to shut down the console and retrieve the key.

He wears it around his neck now instead of dog tags, on a chain soldered so that it can never fall off. There are plenty of geniuses out in the world with plenty of government time and money to waste on worthless science projects. Maybe one of them will figure out how to give a physical form to a holographic consciousness. The Kryptonians might never have done it, but Logan has the idea that having a warm, breathing, pleasure-seeking body wasn't very important to the Kryptonians...not most of them anyway.

And if it can't be done, the charm around his neck may be the only way he'll ever be able to keep Jor-El close to his heart. His fingers close around the indestructible metal. Like this, at least, Jor-El will always be with him,

It'll have to be enough.

**Author's Note:**

> You can order your own replica key from [The Noble Collection](http://www.noblecollection.com/Item--i-JPC-MS-4053), but sadly I have found that it will not make Jor-El appear no matter what you do with it.


End file.
